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Fender Play doesn't judge -- it just teaches you guitar
If you ask Ethan Kaplan, chief product officer of digital at Fender, about the death of the electric guitar, he gets a bit incredulous. And it's easy to understand why. As he's quick to point out, "for some reason, there's still a guitar on every stage." But while he's adamant his company and the industry is perfectly healthy, it's clear some of the cultural cachet of the guitar has dried up. Fender is hoping to turn the tides.
Cut strokes off your golf game with Nike Golf 360
I have been playing golf for a long long time and in all those years I have never met another golfer who wasn't trying to find some way to improve and lower his score. Now Nike Golf 360 contains a number of aids that could do just that. The free universal app requires iOS 7.0 or later. The app offers a number of ways to improve your basic game and lower your scores. Hundreds of golf course score cards are included in the app. You can track scores and other stats for up to four golfers in each round. You will be able to choose which tees you are playing and then get the hole's par and yardage. After playing each hole Nike Golf 360 allows you to enter each golfer's score plus driving information: left, right or in the fairway, if you hit the green in regulation, and how many putts you used. At the end of the round, the app gives you a summary of what your round was like with totals on all these stats compiled in a single screen. So if you only hit 5 of 18 greens in regulation it points to a failing in ball striking. Likewise if you used 34 putts you could probably use work on your short game. This kind of information offers a much better perspective on just where your game comes up short. Now that you know what you need to work on Nike Golf 360 provides you with tips and videos on just how to improve all parts of your game: how to hit the ball further, how to get your wedge shots closer to the hole, how to get those lag putts close enough so you don't three-putt and a lot more. The app has a feature that allows you to record your own golf swing and play it back so you can see just what you look like. Most golfers have no idea what they do with their bodies during their swing. Plus the app provides video of all the Nike contract golfers: Tiger Woods, Rory McIlroy, Michelle Wie and others so you can watch these professionals and compare your swing to theirs. Additionally, the app provides information and training videos that will assist your golf fitness and flexibility. The videos show you what exercises to do, how to do them, and specifically what they are intended to do for your game. Nike Golf 360 also allows you to share your results with your friends or others. You can use Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram to send pictures from your round and all the data you collected. Using this feature you can set up a competition with your friends and develop leaderboards that track which golfer hits the most fairways or uses the fewest number of putts. Nike Golf 360 provides golfers with numerous game improvement tips and aids and gives users a good starting point to becoming a better golfer. However as I have discovered through the years even with all this information to really improve your game you need to practice, practice, practice.
Swing better and lower your scores with Golfer Setup
If you play golf you know how frustrating the game can be. Golfer Setup, a US$.99 Universal app runs on iOS 7.1 and could help you eliminate some of those frustrations. First be aware the developer of this app is not a golf professional. He claims to be an avid golfer who through hard work and lots of studying the golf swing has lowered his average score from an 18 handicap down to about a 3. The basic information contained in his app parallels golf instruction I received over the last twenty years from one of the best teaching pros in Florida. So following the instructions should get you off to a good start. Both the app and my golf pro friend stress that most amateurs are in trouble before they ever start to take the club back in their swings. Golfer Setup stresses the need for golfers to be in the correct position before they swing. My pro called it GAPS: Grip, Alignment, Positioning, and Stance. If those are not correct, golfers cannot make a successful swing. Golfer Setup uses a quote from Jack Nicklaus, "If you set up correctly, there's a good chance you'll hit a reasonable shot, even if you make a mediocre swing. If you set up to the ball poorly, you'll hit a lousy shot even if you make the greatest swing in the world." This app breaks the golf swing down for a driver and fairway woods and for irons. Golfer Setup then offers detailed views from behind and from the side of a golfer at setup. Once you have selected one of the views, you receive a further breakdown on just where all parts of your body should be at address before you swing. This includes your head, arms, shoulders, hands, feet, hips, knee and back. Users can then select one of the body parts and receive a more detailed description of the proper positioning, and explanation why to do it this way, and information on the most common faults. The app shows you what it looks like and what happens if you do it correctly and what happens if you do it the wrong way. The side view also discusses the proper positioning of the golf ball in your stance for specific clubs, off your left heel for the driver, in the middle of your stance for most irons, and slightly further back for wedges. The message is clear in Golfer Setup. Golfers need to get into their bodies, hands, feet, and head into the correct position before they can improve. If you do that I would expect your scores will start to come down. Golfer Setup is also offered in a Free version however, that version does not allow you access to all the views and breakdowns available in the paid app.
Daily Mac App: Clarify
We're unabashed fans of the folks at Blue Mango Learning Systems; in fact, we did a video introduction to their flagship product, ScreenSteps, after we met with them at Macworld Expo 2008. ScreenSteps has saved countless hours of effort in quickly developing software documentation, but the Blue Mango team realized that it may be overkill for streamlined communications aimed at reducing the frequency of roundtrip email exchanges. That's the origin story of the new Clarify, a simplified take on screenshot-driven document creation that's meant to help everyone deliver clear and easy-to-understand instructions with a minimum of effort. The app is about as simple as can be: take a screenshot or series of screenshots as you walk through your process, then document them with as little or as much detail as you need. You can export to PDF with a single click, save your instructions to Dropbox for third-party review, or upload to the free Clarify-It web service. If you're already a ScreenSteps user, you'll be pretty comfortable with Clarify. It adds a few niceties (a menu-bar screenshot tool, highlight and border controls) while dispensing with the document library and workgroup editing features. It also drops the automatic capture of clipboard screenshots, which I regret; that's one of my favorite ScreenSteps tricks. Still, the Clarify UI is nice and clean, and it's easy to create solid documents in very short order. You can copy and paste your instructions as RTF for use with Word, Evernote or other destinations. If you need to include real-world images (versus screenshots) in your instructions -- say, to help rental tenants find climate controls or light switches in an apartment -- drag the pictures from the Finder, iPhoto or Aperture right into your Clarify document. Clarify is available as a 14-day trial and can be purchased direct or via the Mac App Store. Normal pricing is $29.99 for a single-platform license (Mac or PC), $39.99 for both platforms; however, through October 19 there's a $10 discount offer available. It's true, you could certainly make similar screenshot-driven instructions with Word or Pages, but if you spend any substantial fraction of your time describing tasks step-by-step you can save yourself aggravation and effort by giving Clarify a shot. If you think you need the power of ScreenSteps instead, the base license is $39.95.
EVE University turns six years old today
EVE Online has made a name for itself as an MMO with a steep learning curve. Getting into the game can be a daunting experience for new players, particularly if they want to get involved in PvP. Six years ago today, EVE player "Morning Maniac" founded the EVE University corporation in an effort to combat exactly that problem. Since then, they've been EVE's best-known new player training corp, providing free training and supplies to players getting to grips with the game. The program has seen over 10,000 new players pass through and graduate on to bigger and better things. Their success has spawned many other training corps over the years, including those focused on piracy. In his six year birthday announcement, Kelduum Revaan of EVE University talked about how the game had changed over the years, adding that "one thing has remained constant - there are always new players, and there is always more to learn." At last year's five year anniversary, a brief history of the corp graced the EVE news. Since then, EVE University has gone from strength to strength, with some impressive achievements over the last twelve months. Over 3,000 new players entered the program this year, for a time making EVE University possibly the biggest single corp in the game. They were even recommended by PC Gamer magazine as the best place for new players to start their EVE journey. This year also saw the opening of their wormhole operations division and the opening of access to NPC nullsec regions for members. The corp looks forward to expanding operations and we at Massively wish them every success over the coming year.
Darkfall gets its own analog of EVE University: Newborn on Agon
The settings of Darkfall and EVE Online are worlds apart, but there is some common ground between the titles. PvP combat permeates both sandbox games, and given a potentially hostile environment when starting out, it's always good to have a helping hand. EVE Online players have training corps like EVE University to show them the ropes in what can sometimes be a brutal game. Darkfall now has an analog of EVE University called "NEW" which Syncaine recently pointed out on his blog, Hardcore Casual. NEW is short for "Newborn on Agon", a North American server clan that provides training in most any facet of the game for those willing to learn. Although Darkfall can be harsh to newer players, NEW provides a (comparatively) safe environment where players can spend 30 days learning what interests them, or developing the skills to succeed in the game once it's time to move on. The clan is politically neutral and owns the city of Hammerdale, contributing to NEW's potential to become a haven for new players. Also, some of Darkfall's major alliances support the idea of NEW which could be beneficial in the long run. It's great to see things like this happen in sandbox MMOs, and hopefully Darkfall will continue to see its players establish lasting institutions in the game.
EVE University celebrates fifth anniversary
Anyone who's played EVE Online for any length of time is likely to concede that it can be a complex game. While the developers have taken steps to better guide new players into EVE's setting of New Eden through the New Player Experience and the EVE Careers Guide, it's really the playerbase itself that can be the greatest asset to a new pilot. There are several player corporations (guilds) in EVE Online that can help show new players the ropes. Perhaps the real pioneer in training corps in the game is EVE University who have celebrated their fifth anniversary this month. Darian Reymont from EVE Uni writes an excellent description of what the institution is and what it offers to the playerbase, found at the EVE University homepage: "A unique concept in the universe of EVE, the University was - and remains to this day - one of the few truly altruistic organisations in New Eden, supplying free education in all facets of EVE life to any and all who seek it. From humble beginnings as a place where experienced capsuleers could share their wisdom and experience with a handful of new pilots, the University has grown into a mammoth undertaking. Regularly scheduled lessons, supported by weeks of recorded lesson content and thousands of instructive forum posts alongside hundreds of millions of ISK spent every week provide students with the most comprehensive education that can be found anywhere in New Eden."
Analogy explains PvP basics in EVE Online
PvP in EVE Online can take a while to become effective at, and there are a number of factors a player must consider -- both in terms of ship fittings and tactics used -- when engaging opponents. Speed, range, damage types, active tanking vs. passive tanking, when to engage and when to evade, are but a few things that need to be taken into account. Given this complexity, there are players in the game who've recognized that there's a real need for PvP instruction in the game and offer services to that end. Agony Unleashed stands as EVE's premier PvP school, regularly offering courses that show players how to use a given type of ship to its deadliest potential. Baka Lakadaka, of Agony Unleashed, has written a piece for EVE Tribune called "A Tale of Three Waterpistols" that could be useful to a newer player trying to get a handle on PvP in EVE. Check out his article for a look at how tracking, speed, and optimal range are interrelated in EVE, through the easily-understood analogy between children (of different sizes) shooting waterpistols at one another, and the relative strengths and limitations of different ship types.
Richard Bartle laments poor state of game education in the UK
Richard Bartle -- the man who co-invented MUDs at the University of Essex in 1978 -- described the poor state of game-related academic study and education when speaking at the Edinburgh Interactive Festival a few days ago.Bartle made a distinction between games-focused training (the acquisition of skills by instruction) and games-focused education (the development of understanding through learning). He said that the United Kingdom's colleges are short on education, even though training is available at some universities.He noted that symptoms of this problem are already apparent: the academic community, such as it is, has been unable to agree (or even engage in cohesive discourse) about the reasons men and women often play as characters of a different sex than their own in MMOs.
DS Daily: What remains
DS cartridges are tiny. Really effing tiny. So small, in fact, that with but a matchbox, one can generally hold as many games as he or she could possibly need in a single trip out.The games, of course, aren't sold as such. They come in boxes, proprietary boxes. There are very few, if any, specially made racks and stands for these cases, and many find them to be nothing more than a hindrance. Our question to you: do you keep the boxes and instruction manuals for DS games, and if you do, do you actually store each game inside its respective box? They quite literally inflate the size of the game by a factor of a hundred ... do you stand for it?
Because you can never be too safe
You've heard the stories. Seen it on the news. Nintendo Wii consoles, on a rampage. Decimating joints, impaling innocent television screens, and taking candy from babies. We here at Nintendo Wii Fanboy place your safety at the very tippy-top of our list (but right below Twilight Princess), and thus, we'd like you to peruse this new and improved safety catalog for the Wii.Some things on this list were obvious, like not skydiving with the Wii and attempting to use it as a parachute. But did you know that the Wii cannot toast bread? Fooled the hell out of us. We beg of you: for your own safety, take a glance at these helpful pictures.The more you know.[via GameBrink; thanks to all those that sent this in!]
